Bold, bold choices

Last night on Countdown, I swear* Keith Olbermann said something about how President-elect Obama's hypothetically possibly choosing Hillary Clinton as his Secretary of State would be a bold move because it would place a woman in such a high office.

A few moments later he clued in and noted that the current Secretary of State is Condoleezza Rice.

Great job, Keith, except Madeleine Albright was appointed Secretary of State by President Bill Clinton in 1996 and served through 2000.

[insert "Worst Persons" ominous theme music here]

But wait! There's more!

This morning on KIRO AM 710, Dave Ross said something about how President-elect Obama's even-more-hypothetically possibly choosing Colin Powell as his Secretary of State would be a bold move because it would place an African-American in such a high office.

He did not manage to clue in that the current Secretary of State is Condoleezza Rice.

And, somehow, even though this was the whole point of the discussion, did not put it together that Colin Powell, having been appointed in 2001 by President GW Bush and having served through 2005, has already been Secretary of State.

In conclusion, people:

• We have already had two female Secretaries of State.
• We have already had two African-American Secretaries of State.

I realize that we are really, really enjoying the historic-ness of the present moment, but let's come to grips with the fact that the State Department's historic moment has passed.

Hell, I'm not sure even an openly gay or lesbian Secretary of State would be that bold a move... unless she or he has the temerity to want to get married or something.

(Seattle March for Equality tomorrow, November 15, Volunteer Park, 10:30 AM with keynote speakers starting at noon...!!)

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* I did not rewind or write down the exact quote or look online for the video today, so standard disclaimers apply.

Election Day transcendence

I tempted, no, taunted fate by wearing a RED shirt* to work on Election Day.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that Kyle wore a blue one. (Certainly without as much "meta" or superstition as me.)


I would like it very much if we could follow President-elect Obama's lead and be less "red" and "blue" in our collective political thinking. This is not to say that I'm turning away in the slightest from my values, nor Kyle from his, which will make it an interesting exercise.
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* Not a Star Trek reference.

Election Day synchronicity

Interesting mix here in my Twitter feed.

Now go vote!

Suki Halloween Costume

The Challenge: For Halloween, LG wanted to be Suki, Kyoshi Warrior from Avatar: The Last Airbender.


The Mission: Design an awesome, accurate Suki costume for Halloween which would, we hoped, also be wearable for next year's Anime Con and Emerald City ComiCon.

The Staff: Lead designer and dressmaker: my mom. Headdress and makeup: me. Lead researcher, accessories and finishing details: LG's mom. Kyoshi Warrior attitude: all LG.

The Project:

We spent a morning at JoAnn Fabrics picking out clothing and costume patterns that contained different elements mom could piece together to create the final dress pattern. LG located fabrics that exactly matched the colors in our screen printout. I took some wild guesses at yardage. We picked up a few notions that we thought mom wouldn't already have.

Mom did some shopping for supplemental patterns in better sizes, and modified the design to be expandable in a variety of ways in case it needs to be altered next spring.

Barb picked up fans, two shades of gold spray paint, tassels, and other items. We each shopped for a variety of items to try for the facepaint. Very annoying that all the Halloween brands say not to use red around the eyes.

I designed and built the headdress out of a Clorox bottle and some chopsticks from Panda Express. I glued green bias tape to the wraparound headband area and added laces for adjustable sizing. We painted the pieces using Barb's gold spray paints and assembled with a hot glue gun.

Barb spray-painted the fans and applied gold medallions and tassels to finish up the costume.

On Halloween evening, LG finished dinner, suited up, and we sat down for a makeup application (which was long enough and unpleasant enough to give her serious second thoughts about her showbiz career aspirations). We used Clinique foundation base, white drugstore greasepaint (dabbed on with a makeup sponge), cornstarch powder to set the white, and then Wet 'n' Wild black eyeliner pencil and Wet 'n' Wild red lipstick (applied with a lip brush) for the designs.

The Result:


Perfection. Look for LG and a gaggle of proud grownups at next year's Cons!